THE PORIRUA APPEAL CASE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 12649, 29 April 1903, Page 5

THE PORIRUA APPEAL CASE

SIR E. BARTON'S VIEWS

Press Association—By Telegraph—Copyright. SYDNEY, Anril 28. -(Received April 28', at 10.26* a.m.) Sir E. Barton, referring to the criticisms of the New Zealand judges on the Privy Council, said that he • traced in their remarks a curious similarity to the criticisms often passed here in legal circles. Without giving a personal opinion, he pointed out that at the present moment the House of Lords was not a Court of Appeal for cases arising in the colonies, nor is the Privy Council a. Court of Appeal, generally speaking, for cases arising witinn the United Kingdom. Privy Councillors' conclusions took the form of advice to the Crown, and not of judgments in the ordinary sense of tho term, hence a difficulty seemed to be felt in many legal minds in regard to facing the. Hons9 of Lords and the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, or adopting either of them for a final Court of Appeal. Dealing with the conference held in 1901, to discuss the question of a final Court of Appeal, whereat Mr Justice Hodges represented the Commonwealth and Sir James Prendergast New Zealand, ho said that the delegates of the self-governing colonies in the main did not support Mi Justice Hodges, lienco matters remained as they wero. Several members of the Federal Parliament have accepted the New Zealand judges' remarks as an additional argument in favour of the early establishment of a Federal High Court.